Border officer sentenced in bribery scheme

San Diego  A federal judge sentenced a former U.S. Customs and Border Protection officer to 12 years in prison Friday for taking bribes to allow cars loaded with drugs to pass through his inspection lane in Calexico.

The sentencing of Oscar Ortiz Martinez, 33, marks the second time in less than two weeks that a border security official has been sent to prison on corruption-related charges. On June 21 brothers Raul and Fidel Villarreal, former Border Patrol agents, were sentenced to 35 years and 30 years in prison for running a lucrative human-smuggling ring.

Ortiz was stationed at the Calexico Port of Entry in Imperial County and had been hired by the agency in 2008. Prosecutors said that just months after he began working there he began taking money to allow drug loads through.

He and a co-defendant, Victor Manuel Silva, believed they were dealing with a drug-smuggling ring. But they were actually involved with undercover federal agents who had been alerted to the two men by an undercover informant, according to court records and testimony at Ortiz’s trial in September.

In all, Ortiz accepted some $22,000 in cash bribes between October 2009 and May 2010. He was arrested in September 2010 when he was about to collect another $30,000 after allowing a car he thought carried methamphetamine through his inspection lane two nights earlier.

He was convicted of bribery and conspiracy to import drugs following a weeklong trial. The evidence included audio recordings made by the confidential informant when he met with Ortiz and Silva, and video recordings by agents that showed Ortiz leaving one meeting carrying a bag full of bribe money. Agents with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Office of Inspector General for the Department of Homeland Security conducted the investigation.

Prosecutors argued that Ortiz should be sentenced to 20 years in prison. In a statement, U.S. Attorney Laura Duffy said most border officers are honest, but those who are corrupt and “violate the public’s trust and put our borders at risk” will be prosecuted.

Silva and Ortiz had met while both worked for a private security company that staffed an immigration jail in El Centro. A former U.S. Marine, Ortiz worked at the jail between 2002 and 2008 but pined to work in federal law enforcement, according to court records.

At one point he applied for a job with CBP and completed the agency’s academy training, but he could not get hired on. His lawyer, Jeremy Warren, wrote in court documents that he was denied a job because a background check turned up a restraining order that his ex-wife had filed against him several years earlier.

But Ortiz reapplied to the agency and was hired in 2008. It came during a massive hiring surge in border law enforcement. The number of Customs and Border Protection employees, which includes Border Patrol agents and customs officers, went from 43,000 in 2006 to 52,000 in 2008, according to a report by the General Accounting Office. At the end of 2012, the total force had grown to more than 60,000.

During that time the agency has been hit by a number of corruption-related arrests and convictions. More than 150 Border Patrol agents and customs officers have been arrested or indicted on bribery, smuggling and other corruption charges. Critics have said the pace of the hiring spree led to relaxed standards for admission and spotty or incomplete background checks.